Archangels
by Love is for Fools
Summary: Following clues left behind by his late mother, Gabriel goes in search of his real father, Eric. Raoul de Chagny, the man who raised him, wants nothing more to bring the boy he considers his own back home. Other people just can't help, but get in the way.


**Love is for Fools: My first PotO fanfiction! I wanted to write something in which Raoul was not a complete fop, Eric was for once wrong about Raoul, and Christine is a grandmaster mind of a plot to have the two men raise her child in a balance of crazy and not so crazy. I'll let you determine who is the crazy one in this. **

**Things you should know: A mix of Leroux and Movie-verse**

**Warnings: Probable occness among other things.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own PotO, but I do own the character of Gabriel**

**Summary: Christine's death is devastating to both husband and child. Especially, since the truth comes out. The husband is not the father, and the father doesn't want the child. And, the child doesn't want his mother's husband, but the husband wants the child as his own. A story of Raoul, Eric, and Gabriel, the son of the Phantom.**

**.:xxxxXxxxx:.**

The man wearily paced in the corridors of his water-side home, wearing down the expensive imported carpets. His thoughts were stricken with worry for his beautiful wife, Christine, who was in labor. The woman he fought so hard for and won. No...the woman who fought for him and won.

Raoul de Chagny had never been so nervous, not even when he looked the Phantom of Death in the face.

"The pregnancy was going so well, why the complications now?"

A reply came from an archway, but it did not answer his question.

"Father, there are always going to be some sort of complications, whether with the actual birth or the circumstances in which that child is birthed."

His son came out from his room to lean against the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest. At the age of fourteen Gabriel de Chagny towered over his father by a few inches. Inches that the father often felt when standing in close proximity to him. Gabriel had inherited his parents golden locks, but that was all. In all honestly, he did not look his father's son.

"I know, I know, Gabriel. Forgive your father, I cannot help but worry."

The boy peered at him questioningly.

"You use to not."

The Comte attempted to smile, but it turned to a more grim look. He dared not tell his son his fears. It was his responsibility to be the one counted on, not his son who was still to young to shave.

His wife was getting on in her years and her body was frailer now than when she had Gabriel. He worried greatly that she would not make it—no, more than worry troubled him, fear resonated through his body, making it nearly impossible to stand on his two feet, but also to sit still and wait.

"Time has taught me that no one is invincible, not even your mother."

With that, the sound of a door opening in a hallway was heard. Both father and son rushed to hear the results. They met with the nursemaid wiping her hands on her--no longer-- white apron. She refused to meet their eyes.

Raoul's blood ran cold and knew the worst might have come to pass. He could not give up hope, yet though.

"Michelle, how are they?" He had to know, he needed to know they were alright. But, no answer. "Michelle," he nearly roared, "how are they?" A cry ripped from the poor woman's throat and she flung herself at the wall. Gabriel jumped to restrain the grief-hysterical woman, who was almost another mother to him. He trapped her arms to her sides, to stop her self-destructing harm.

Raoul slowly passed them, hoping that this was only a joke played on him by his wife, perhaps to test how truly happy he was about the child. In the room was a bed, and a body with a sheet over it. He carefully approached, his heart in his head. A shaking hand lifted up the sheet, and sob shuddered through his body at the sight of her. Shock shattered into a million pieces and left a broken man behind.

Her golden curls were still wet with perspiration, skin unhealthily pale, and unmoving dull blue eyes.

Tears came to his eyes and his body shook from the effort of holding in his sobs. A hand gently landed on his shoulder spinning him around to face the gentle gold irises of his son.

The sight of the boy's face made him cry even harder, but he shed his tears for many reasons. He cried for his wife who would never again sing her joys and her sorrows, he cried for the child he would never know, he cried for his son who he knew could not bring himself to cry and he cried for himself—the man not strong enough to comfort his own son, but instead was comforted by that son.

.:xxxxXxxxx:.

Hours later, Gabriel carefully closed the door to his father's room, drifting as if in a cloud of fog to the study. Sinking into the nearest armchair in a fetal position he fell asleep, only to wake shortly to Michelle's soft call. She looked nervous, her lips barely visible they were stretched so far.

"I have something for you. From your mother, in the eventuality that something might happen to her."

Her hands shook as she handed over the letter, her last duty fulfilled. She had lost her dearest friend, and now, she knew she would lose the boy she helped to raise and had come to love greatly. Michelle left the room without turning back.

In her mind echoed her last wish for the young boy.

_Do not let this define who you are, as it will surely change you._

_**Dearest Gabriel,**_

_**I fear that if you are reading this that I am in some way incapacitated or dead. It may be inconsiderate of me to ask this of you, but please be strong, and believe what words I have to say. What you may hear might destroy you, but it is of deepest importance that you know.**_

_**The man, Raoul de Chagny, that you have known as your father, is not. **_

_**I suspect he knows as much, and I hope that my death (or such similar happenings) will not change his love for you, and I know he does love you. Your father, your real father, is a great, but terrible man. If you ever wish to find the man who is your father, please pay a visit to MME. Valerius, she will give you something to guide you on your way. If you do so choose to seek him, do not let Raoul know, he will keep you from him. In his heart, it will be for your benefit, but no child should ever go without knowing their real father. Even if only to learn to appreciate what they have.**_

_**Love, your mother**_

_**Christine De Chagny**_

Gabriel burned the letter with disdain in his heart..

.:xxxxXxxx:.

Morning came and Gabriel laid still awake in his bed unable to forget the words in the letter. He refused to believe it, someone must have forged her hand. Though Michelle was not the type of woman who would allow such a falsehood. The thought made him sick. He drew his knees towards his chest and gripped them tightly. But, still after all, no tears would come.

Breakfast was a dark affair with only a sullen cook to keep him company, his father still slumbered in his room. Gabriel finished quickly and made for the study again. Along the way he passed the parlor, doors swung wide open, and sun shone on the dark surface of the piano that was more a decoration in the recent years than an instrument of music

When he was younger he had wished to play it, and his mother absolutely delighted pressured her husband into hiring a teacher. It was not very hard to make him cave in, and once Gabriel's lessons had progressed he and Christine both enjoyed many a night listening to their son. He was a natural, a gift from the Angels of music, the instructor had said. His mother agreed, but his father had only stared in silence.

The brightness of the room seemed to proclaim that it felt no sadness for the loss of his mother, and he was tempted to make it sound with such sadness to bring tears to tears to his own eyes, and feeling to his heart.

Hesitant fingers ran over the keys, not applying pressure. Taking a seat he composed himself before he allowed his hands to take command. No particular song was played, just some thing that told his pain.

A pretend world easily came to him, and he imagine his mother holding his new brother sitting on the couch listening and his father standing to the side of the piano...

Except the image of his father wasn't imagined. Gabriel's playing came to an abrupt stop. The Vicomte looked at him intensely with ocean blue eyes, and there was something in them that sent chills down his spine.

"Father? Did I wake you, I'm sorry."

Gabriel held his breath as he came around the piano to stand to the right of him. The breath went whooshing out in as a cry of pain as his father gripped him by the shoulder tightly.

"Why do you not cry? Do you not care that your mother will be laid to rest soon in her grave? Is she not enough to bring tears to your eyes, or what of your sibling? Perhaps you wished for his death, and so caused your mother's because of your selfishness. I did not raise my son to be so cold!"

He didn't know, he didn't know why he couldn't cry. And, he never wished death on any person.

His father's irrationalness was an air-riding plague that spread through words. In his own despair and unreason he couldn't help himself and shouted the words that had haunted him all night.

"But, I am not your son!"

Gabriel ripped himself from the hands of the man he no longer called father, storming from the room to make plans to find the who was his real father.

**.:xxxxXxxxx:.**

**This chapter has been revised for your reading pleasure, okay, not really. I'm just changed a little of the wording, but if any of you still think the way it's wrote is to jarring then I'll gladly change it. I usually don't write like this anyways.**

**In the next chapter:**

**Gabriel starts off his adventure rashly, and his lack of planning ends with him wet and less than pleased. Raoul realizes how cruelly he acted towards his son, and upon discovering that Gabriel has gone figures out what direction he is going and makes plans to follow after him. As for Eric...he has absolutely no clue what's in store for him**


End file.
